page_title: 86th (Royal County Down) Regiment of Foot
section_title: The Victorian era
hierarchical_section_title: 86th (Royal County Down) Regiment of Foot / History / The Victorian era
caption_attribution_description: Uniform of the 86th Foot.
context_page_description: The 86th (Royal County Down) Regiment of Foot was an infantry regiment of the British Army, raised in 1793. Under the Childers Reforms it amalgamated with the 83rd Regiment of Foot to form the Royal Irish Rifles in 1881.
context_section_description: The regiment embarked for the West Indies in October 1826. It was initially based in Trinidad but moved to Barbados in January 1828, Antigua in January 1830 and Demerara and Berbice in February 1833. It embarked for home in March 1837. It returned to India in 1842 and saw action in Central India during the Indian Rebellion. It formed part of the force led by Major-General Sir Hugh Rose which besieged and captured Jhansi Fort in April 1858: four Victoria Crosses were awarded to members of the regiment for this operation. It returned home in August 1859 and was deployed to Gibraltar in 1864 and then went on to Mauritius in 1867 before returning to the Cape of Good Hope in 1870. It returned home in 1875 and then embarked for Bermuda in 1880.
  As part of the Cardwell Reforms of the 1870s, where single-battalion regiments were linked together to share a single depot and recruiting district in the United Kingdom, the 86th was linked with the 83rd (County of Dublin) Regiment of Foot and assigned to district no. 63 at Victoria Barracks, Belfast. On 1 July 1881 the Childers Reforms came into effect and the regiment amalgamated with the 83rd (County of Dublin) Regiment of Foot to form the Royal Irish Rifles.
caption: Regimental uniform, 1840s
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